The Rag and Bone Shop
by Quillslinger
Summary: A collection of brief, largely unconnected stories about Itachi and Shisui. Some will be short, others long. Quite a few will be AUs. Needless to say, there will be slash.
1. one

A collection of brief, largely unconnected stories about Itachi and Shisui. Some will be short, others long. Quite a few will be AUs. Basically I've written too many of these and they have to go somewhere. I hope you'll enjoy reading them.

* * *

><p>my tongue remembers your wounded flavor<p>

. . .

Seven years ago Shisui stood at the edge of the training ground holding his hands out to Itachi in twin fists. The chilled sunlight of the afternoon sheathed him in a glasslike brilliance. That winter, he was the only brother Itachi would admit. "Pick one," he said, an out-of-the-blue request. "What is it?" Itachi asked, but Shisui just shook his head. His expression was as cold as the light that struck it, betraying nothing.

A sudden unease stirred within Itachi, breaking the surface of something he couldn't place. What had he done to deserve this? Why was this choice suddenly being forced upon him? What unimaginable number of things could be held in your hand – a pebble, a mini-bomb, the willing hand of another? Confusion gave way to irritation, he gave his honest answer: "I don't want to choose."

"Come on, just do it," Shisui cajoled. The pushy confidence in his voice just made Itachi angrier. He didn't want Shisui to throw him off balance, didn't want to yield to him that privilege anymore. Didn't Shisui understand what he was doing? Didn't he know you ought to fear choices? Choices had power. Choices mustn't be taken so lightly, and even at ten Itachi knew that, so why didn't Shisui? Why didn't he know _anything?_

"No."

Shisui's eyes, which in those days could still manage the shock of indignation, narrowed in resentment. "Fine," he grumbled, stuffing his unopened hands into his pockets. He was not used to being rebuffed, and would never be. Relieved from the burden of choices, Itachi was filled with remorse. This was the downside of his personality. "Wait," he said in contrition. "I'll choose." Shisui shook his head adamantly, unkempt bangs fluttering over his eyes. "Forget it."

"Shisui, I will choose."

"I said forget it, okay?" Shisui snapped, still not looking at Itachi. "Let's just go back to training, or it'll be dark before we're done." He walked away without another word.

. . .

That was to be the end of it, and if Shisui seemed to receive him with a noticeable coolness in the following days, it soon passed like most childish grudges with all their tempestuous agony and bloodless carnage. They remained friends, and grew up as such. But though he had done nothing wrong – though nothing right either – Itachi found himself constantly returning to the mystery of his denied choices. What had Shisui held in his hands that day? Truths or jests? The older he grew, the more ludicrous the possibilities became, evolving into strange binaries. Silence or music? Tenderness or brutality? Hope or despair? The obsession tapered away as the years passed but from time to time he would be startled by a sudden reminder – the sight of Sasuke's small hands, for example, closed in eager fists. It was all rather pointless. Likelier than not Shisui himself had forgotten all about it. Still, he wondered. What had Shisui held in his hands?

. . .

All through the siege of summer they fought, until they had laid waste to each other and lost it all. By now Itachi had forgotten much. He no longer wondered what Shisui's hands had held, sweetness or bitterness, reunion or parting. The future they had dreamt of was now the past, and different. He couldn't remember it anymore, that vaguely unimaginable situation. He was learning to unlearn his fondness for Shisui anyway, his warm human smell and the unconscious gnashing of his teeth in sleep. All this was preparation for a number of unavoidable tasks, made so that he wouldn't slip on smooth river stones. Wouldn't howl when the first clod of dirt hit the casket, making a cold music. Would feel only the tremor of his calm heart striking the hours tracing the ending's slow descent. Time had taught him a thing or two.

. . .

Seven years later, with a country between him and the past, Itachi saw from the edge of his balcony a curious sight. His hair had grown longer since that summer, his bones leaner, and his heart had begun a new countdown, stuttering toward another ending. Amegakure, buttressed, scavenged, policed, was a nation of endings. These weeping alien skies rife with dampness and longing seemed painfully appropriate. He had, until that moment, been mentally counting the drops rining like teeth on the battered tin roofing. It had become a way of managing the days.

On the street corner below, two children of similar age faced each other in the pale mizzle. In this city of scabbed streets and sunken avenues, their presence seemed unthinkable. The girl held out before her two tightly closed fists in expectation. _"Pick one."_The same unreasonable demand, delivered with the same frosty expression. Itachi let his gaze drift to the boy, and was afforded with the strange luxury of seeing his own emotions playing out on another's face, the fretful childish pique that fluxed through your body like a spanking, goaded blood welling from a cut. He saw eyes that mirrored his skepticism.

Under a scrutiny unknown to him, the boy sucked in a longsuffering breath – raised a finger and pointed. A choice, made. The coil of muscle within Itachi's chest flexed against the ribs of its cage in unwilling anticipation. The girl did not speak, her face masklike and unaffected. Her companion frowned, opening his mouth in impatience. The charade lifted then by way of an impish smile, and with an elfin giggle that leapt right across the years, the child opened her fist to reveal a bright red drop of candy, glowing against the white of her palm.

Now those smallish figures blurred away behind the hardening rain, so quickly lost it was as if they had never been, nothing more than ghosts from another age. Still Itachi did not move from the railings, gripped by an agonizing levity, like the empty room morning poured into. He knew now that it was he who had not understood the power of choices. This was a rending he must yield to. He grieved then as he never had before – for Shisui, for himself, for a truncated love in luckless numbered days, a nothing that was something or maybe just the after-ache of it.

. . .

end


	2. two

In this story, a young man receives a strange visitor.

* * *

><p>Maples Leaves, Croquettes, and Him<p>

…

One very lovely day in low June, Itachi opens his front door to find a handsome boy standing on the steps. He's wearing a school uniform Itachi doesn't recognize, top buttons undone to reveal clavicles sharp under pale, gleaming skin.

It's just one of those things.

"Uchiha Itachi, is it?"

"Yes? May I help you?"

"Please go out with me," the boy says, smiling a smile of astonishing breadth and confidence. "I'm in love with you."

Itachi considers stepping back inside to brew a bracing cup of tea, but quickly collects himself. It is frankly not the first time he's had to deal with out-of-the-blue confessions of love. He's got it down to a science.

"I'm very honored," he begins, gentle but firm. "Thank you for your regard, but I'm afraid I cannot accept it."

The stranger cocks his head charmingly, like a guileless pigeon. "Why not?"

"You don't know anything about me."

"That's not true," the boy replies. "The very first time I saw you, I already knew three things about you."

Now, as any sane person would be, Itachi is rendered speechless by this terribly odd remark. His visitor apparently takes this as invitation to elaborate. "It was last year, in October. I was on a school trip to Tokyo, and I saw you in Ueno Park, sitting under a maple tree. You looked so beautiful I thought it was an illusion."

Itachi considers a variety of responses, and settles for, "…"

"You were eating croquettes—look, I even brought you some." The boy smirks as he quickly shoves a greasy package into Itachi's hands. "You looked like you were really enjoying them, I was surprised. You don't look like the kind of guy who's into food that much. I'm not wrong, am I? You really, really like croquettes, don't you?"

The morning sun is suddenly very oppressive on the side of his face. Once more he gives thought to the increasingly attractive notion of going inside for that cup of tea. Surely it would go well with these newly-obtained snack items.

"That's not all. When I saw you in the park, you were with another guy. I think you might have been watching the leaves together."

"He was a senior from school. I –"

"You were dating him, weren't you?"

"How –" He swallows and tries again, "How did you know that?"

"Was obvious," says the boy. "I told you already, I knew three things about you." Three fingers go up in the air, trim and fine and aristocratic. "But that was all. I knew that you liked maple leaves and croquettes… and him." The manic light in those slanted eyes dims for a split second, but no more than that. They are rather well-shaped eyes, but who thinks this?

For no reason at all, Itachi feels the back of his collar stick uncomfortably to his neck. "We are no longer involved."

"Oh, I know that." His visitor has that expression on his face again, like he's exceedingly pleased with himself. "I'm sleeping with him, you see."

Suddenly the day feels much cooler, in a way that has nothing to do with the icy Fuji-proportioned weight that has settled in his stomach.

"Kisame," the boy clarifies, as though addressing perceived confusion. "He's studying at Hokudai, isn't he? It's right by Sapporo Station, that's where I ran into him. I couldn't believe it either. It _must_ be fate. It was tough getting him to go along with it, too – college guys all think high school students are bush league or something, it's so annoying. But I really gave it my all."

"I see." That clears up quite a few things. "Congratulations. Hoshigaki-sempai did mention there was someone new."

"Oh." The boy looks startled for a split second, but again, no longer. Remorse never does seem to stick with this type. "Well, don't make that face. I wanted to know more about you, and how else was I supposed to do that? He was my only clue!"

At this point, he really just cannot help himself any longer. "Did sempai… talk about me?"

"_As if_." The boy scoffs, and kicks the duffel bag at his feet – Itachi never noticed its existence till now, and is rather uneasy for it. "I wouldn't have asked anyway. That'd be breaking the rules."

Rules?

"I had other ways, though," the boy goes on in the manner of one utterly engrossed in talking to himself. "It's the little things, you know? Like when we're out, he has this thing where he always buys frozen yogurt. He doesn't like it, and he knows I don't either, so it's got to be force of habit, right? I'm right, aren't I? You do like frozen yogurt, don't you?"

Itachi fails to respond.

The stranger smiles again, alike at his silent confirmation and verklempt state. "And I know where you went on your first date, 'cause he's always going on about 'kids and Fake Venice'."

Mentally, he crosses out Tokyo Disney Sea from the list of places to visit in the near future.

"And your birthday is on June 9th. I made sure to arrive half a week early."

It wouldn't be imprudent perhaps to give Kisame a leisurely call as well. Maybe send him a mildly-worded letter. On poisoned paper. Written with toxic ink.

"See? When I first saw you, I only knew those three things but now I know all that, and loads more too. So you can't say that I don't know anything about you, can you?" Here the stranger takes a step forward, emphasizing his superior height or perhaps the roguishly scarred underside of his chin. "Well, since this is the first time you see me, I'll tell you three things about myself."

"I like cherry blossoms."

"I like yakimochi – the savory kind."

"And –" a sigh of vaguely languid longing, "– I'm in love with you."

And with that, the spell is broken. They've come full circle. The sack of croquettes hits the ground. He snaps backward, breaking out into a cold sweat, and manages to grit out, "I think you should leave," while blindly grasping for the door handle in what is most certainly not a surge of panic.

"But—"

"This was fun." He's read stories like this, they never end well. "Let's do it again never."

"Wait," the boy says breathlessly, shoving his shoulder against the door with frustrating force and efficacy. "Don't you want to know at least one more thing about me?"

"No, thank you." This would be a most appropriate junction to put those ten years of jujitsu training to good use. Punching out an unwitting stranger is a reckless, classless act, but it is one of those actions a gentleman is from time to time called upon to perform, according to his wise instructor.

"It's important! I think you'll want to know this."

"I highly doubt that," Itachi says coldly, and pulls back his fist—

"Shisui-kun!"

Before his knuckles could inflict some satisfying damage on that roguishly scarred chin, Itachi sees his mother hurrying up the steps with a shopping bag and an expression that in no way befits the serious nature of the situation. Without a further word, she grabs the stranger and pulls him into a delighted embrace.

"You should have called, we would have picked you up at the airport." She releases her hold only to lean back and pat his cheeks in fond wonderment. "You look just like your pictures. Gosh, you're so _tall_. I haven't seen you since you were a baby and now you're this _giant_."

And turning to her son, Uchiha Mikoto smiles radiantly and says, "Itachi-kun, this is your cousin from Hokkaido. He's come to spend the summer. I don't think you two have met."


	3. three

A summer affair thing where Shisui didn't grow up with Itachi.

* * *

><p>Last summer, in Bangkok, Itachi found himself separated from his family in the evening rush of an open-air market, and the feeling that overtook him as he walked under that vibrant sky would stay with him all year—a strange, malnourished transparency amidst the gelled crush of humanity, rich with the foreign smells of cardamom and drying fish.<p>

This summer, lying on his back with his knees up and apart, the sheets damp and messy-hot underneath him, it was this same feeling that flushed through him, drawing from his flesh a brimming ache. He looked down the bare landscape of his naked body to where Shisui was half-draped over his hips, head bowed as his shoulders strained in concentration. Through the window, a tangy breeze poured in to rifle through the gauzy curtains. The sea in Okinawa seemed fuller, more powerful than anywhere else, flat as glass and immeasurably blue, the taste of it peppery on Shisui's lips when he had stolen into the room earlier. "Told 'em I felt a bit of sunstroke coming on," he had confided, tongue slipping between Itachi's teeth. "By the end of the week, everyone'll probably think I'm some kind of hypochondriac."

Out there, on the bone-stark sand, their family was oblivious, working off the early afternoon languor in the sharp water. The sun lounged like an indolent beast at the apex of the sky. Sasuke wanted a tan—a rich, glorious olive sheen he could show off to some classmate known only as "that dead-last moron". No one had the heart to inform him that Uchiha didn't tan, as a rule, just go a curious mauve shade, and inevitably the task would fall on Itachi to apply moisturizer to his angry, sunburnt welts that evening.

No one had questioned his decision to stay in for the day. They believed he was being his usual self, catching up on test preps or reading Mishima on the balcony, not doing anything shady like losing his virginity to his cousin in their quiet, somnolent room. The air dense with silence, its solidity perforated only by sibilant hisses of breath. Itachi's hips gave a rough, frantic jerk as Shisui took him in deep, and he came in two strokes, so rushingly quick Shisui's eyes flicked up at him in a mock question. He swallowed and drew himself up, trailed his wet mouth up the tensing line of Itachi's stomach, until they were face-to-face, eyes-to-eyes. The tang of his desire was still thick on Shisui's lips, curving in a hungry smile, whispering, "If I'd known family reunions can be this fun, I'd have gone to more of them."

They had never spoken before this joint vacation, and after the allotted weeks were up, were unlikely to cross paths again, but from the first moment they had kissed and fondled and caressed, letting the privacy of their shared room lead them to their bodies. It had never seemed wrong to surrender into the role of being each other's plaything. The whole afternoon awash in carnal bliss, and then they would rise and dress, make their obligated appearance at the dinner table, where Shisui would smile and laugh, confidently field questions from Itachi's parents. How were his studies, was he thinking about continuing his father's medical practice after graduation, and, inevitably, whether or not he had a girlfriend. And Shisui would say, fine, thank you, yes, he was thinking about it, and no, he was still waiting for the right person to come along, all the while slanting amused looks in Itachi's direction. Graceful and eloquent in the way that Itachi could never manage—which was why Shisui did it for the both of them.

Two radiant weeks, and then they would go back to their respective lives, his in the sedate, upper middle class suburbs of Yokohama, Shisui in gleaming, elegant Sapporo. A ten-hour train ride separated them, but that was beside the point. Far away from the balmy coasts of the East China Sea, they were different people, and months from now, if he should chance upon Shisui—sitting outside some anonymous café, reading and drinking black coffee in an early Hokkaido winter—perhaps they would remain strangers. Perhaps he wouldn't be able to recall the quirk of Shisui's mouth, or the summery freckles that had dusted his cheekbones, and perhaps the flecks of snow residing on the curve of Shisui's lashes wouldn't mean anything to him at all. That was why they were so avid in their adoration, was the reason it was so important that they took all that they could take; now, while the taking was still good. Faced with the prospect of being cut off from the source of their addiction, time became hard currency rather than something flimsy and disposable like, say, flower petals or starlight. The cold mechanics of growing up, all there in the manual. Maybe it was heartbreak in the making and maybe it wouldn't last, and maybe he didn't care.


	4. four

An unauthorized sequel. Mea culpa.

* * *

><p><strong>Escalation<strong>

x

After a week, things had gone from bad to worse to freakishly bizarre.

Shisui narrowed his eyes and clenched his fists. "You did _not _name the cat that."

Itachi appeared to be ignoring him, absorbed in the task of stroking said cat—Madara, he had named it _Madara_—behind the ear. After a moment, he said, "Perhaps it's just me, but I feel that he bears a certain resemblance to Great Uncle."

"In that they're both obscene _sadists_, yes," Shisui snapped. "What the hell is this? Why can't you be a normal person? What do you even _need_ a cat for?"

"A pet can fulfill a person's needs in ways that even other people can't," Itachi said, in perfect seriousness.

"Oh really?" Shisui raised a challenging eyebrow. "Are you having _sex_ with it?"

Itachi just gave him a mulish look. Shisui opened his mouth to further emphasize his point, but all that came out was a horrific sneeze.

Itachi frowned in concern. "Are you okay?"

"I'm fine," Shisui said immediately, forcing down the sniffles. "Seriously, I'm putting my foot down. Either the cat goes, or I'm cutting you off. What's it gonna be?"

Itachi actually seemed to _consider_ it for a moment, which was when Shisui realized that the situation was dire. Any man who would trade in his regular source of carnality for a terrifically unattractive fur ball was clearly seeking an extended stay in the loony bin.

"Sometimes you can be so unreasonable, Shisui," Itachi said, with a put-upon air. He bent to pick up Madara, and trailed elegantly into the kitchen.

"Couch!" Shisui yelled after them. "For a _week_."

x

"Do you have to be this stubborn?" Hana asked with a distinct lack of sympathy. "Why don't you just tell him that you're allergic to cats?"

Shisui glared, and gently gave in to the urge to sneeze all over her turkey sandwich wrap. He momentarily felt bad about it, but Hana was doing something that looked suspiciously like copying calculus problem sets off of his legal pad, so he figured she had it coming.

"Because it's not manly," he groused, barely audible through his stuffy nose. Then again, there wasn't much that was manly about pouring antihistamines down your throat by the pints either. "I'm suffering a lot here. Don't you have anything nicer to say?"

"You lost that privilege when you dumped me for your cousin," Hana informed him.

Shisui sighed, rubbing his watering eyes. "It's so ironic. And to think we broke up because I was afraid you might one day replace me with one of those pound pups you love so much."

Hana pursed her lips in thought. "Well, I'll give you one piece of advice," she said finally. "Fight like a girl."

"If you mean withholding sex, I already tried that—"

"There's another way." Hana smirked wryly. "Come by my house after class."

x

With the fall of the evening, Shisui raced up the stairs to his apartment in elaborately victorious strides. The effect was somewhat mitigated by the incessant sneezing fits, but he was much too overcome with joy to care. Flinging open the door, he planted himself in the entrance and said, "So I've given this whole keeping a pet thing some further thought."

Itachi looked up from his book, immediately wary. "And?"

"And I've come to the conclusion that the only reason—" he made a disgusted face, "—the only reason _Madara _is so restless is because he's cooped up here all day without anyone to play with. Therefore—" he stepped away from the door, "—I've taken the liberty of bringing him a playmate."

On cue, a low, menacing growl filled the room. Madara the cat leapt away from the food dish and scampered onto the dining table, hissing in obvious fear.

"This," Shisui announced with great justice, "is Cujo."

x

Later that night, Shisui lay flat on the couch, sapped of all will to live. In the adjacent armchair, Itachi sat in complete silence with a shell-shocked expression on his face natively found on children from unsettled warzones.

Scattered around them were the detritus of their formerly spotless living room. It had taken nearly a year off of Shisui's life to enforce separation, but they had finally managed to sequester Cujo in the laundry room. Madara, for his part, was snoozing away in Itachi's lap with nary a care. Shisui mentally planned his slow, agonizing death by bathtub-drowning.

Itachi shot him a look brimming with accusatory huffiness. "Some of those books came from the library. Do you have any idea how much money I'll have to pay in fines?"

"Your books?" Shisui said incredulously. "What about my vinyl collection? I'm never going to find another original LP of _Electric Ladyland_ again." He closed his eyes in bleak depression, and pinched his nose, feeling another sneeze coming on.

Itachi wordlessly handed him a Kleenex. "I'll do something about Madara, but you'll have to return Cujo to your classmate as well. An apartment is no place for a dog."

"Cujo's been through a lot in her life," Shisui argued. With a name like Cujo, he shouldn't have been terribly surprised. "She deserves a happy home."

"Happy is not an adjective that comes to mind when I think about our present situation," Itachi replied. Then he sighed, resigned, and said, "I'll call Mother tomorrow to see if she would be willing to take them both. There's plenty of space over there, and Sasuke's always wanted a dog."

"Oh thank _God_," Shisui muttered into his Kleenex. The door to the laundry room clicked open at that moment, and Cujo came bounding out, hopping onto the couch in one leap to curl up affectionately on top of Shisui. At least _somebody_ in this madhouse was on his side.

"I gather that this means I'll be allowed back into the bedroom," Itachi ventured, an anxious note sneaking into his voice.

Shisui chuckled. "Oh, we'll see about that." From atop his stomach, Cujo barked cheerfully in agreement, and Shisui burst out laughing at the baleful look on Itachi's face.

x

**end**


	5. five

_Then you learned how to say: Everything you love tries to get away._

* * *

><p>"Do you think you're going to stop punishing me any time in the next decade?"<p>

Itachi turned from the monitor, fingers paused over his keyboard. Shisui was a shape in the doorway, a stain of paleness marring the otherwise perfect shadow.

He stepped into the room, flicking on the light switch. "Because if not, I'd like to know so I can make certain provisions. Maybe buy myself some thicker skin."

"I don't know what you mean," Itachi said. "In what way have I punished you?"

"Come to the wedding," Shisui said. "Nobody's asking you to make a toast or anything. Just come, or your parents will be angry."

"I'm not suited for weddings," Itachi replied, with a precise smile. "Funerals, on the other hand. Save me an invitation if you ever decide to hold one of those."

"Clever," Shisui said, chuckling mirthlessly. "Are you going to put that in one of your books?"

"It wouldn't sell."

Shisui's hand descended upon his shoulder. He bent low, and placed his mouth right next to Itachi's ear. "Nothing has to change. Nothing has to change if you don't want it to."

Itachi shook himself free and rose to his feet. He wheeled around, so that they were face to face. "Is that something a person should say on the eve of his own wedding?"

"It's okay to be jealous. You don't have to hide your feelings just to spare mine."

"You flatter me. I'm not nearly that selfless."

"And you don't have to be. You try so hard to make yourself out to be someone who can always rise above it all, but in the end, you're only human. You're allowed to feel the human things."

"Is that what you think of me?"

"No," Shisui said matter-of-factly. "It's what you think of yourself. You know me—all I'm meant to do is verbalize the things you think but never say."

"Such as?"

"That you're scared."

Itachi arched an eyebrow. "Really, Shisui?"

"You're only fearless with a pen in your hand," Shisui said. "And for whatever reason, you only choose to fight for things that couldn't possibly bring you any happiness. For as long as I live, I'm never going to understand that."

Which was to say that he was never going to understand Itachi. In all the ways that mattered, it was true.

Itachi's pen moved in straight lines. His prose struck clean, brutal strokes, but everything else in his life always seemed to stray in curves. The paused curl of a smile on Shisui's lips. The dark, silky loop of Itachi's hair twirled around his playful finger. The circle of Shisui's arms snug around his waist. Endless, treacherous coils.

He took a step forward, bridging the distance between them, close enough now to feel Shisui's breath warm on his cheek. Shisui said nothing, not even when Itachi began to unbutton his shirt. One, two, three, and the garment fell open to mid-torso, revealing the blue-black kanji inked into his flesh. A single word right over the heart. A forbidden sign.

"What are you going to do about this?"

Shisui's smile came slow, glazed with nostalgia. It had been nearly ten years since he had shown up on Itachi's doorstep the morning after his eighteenth birthday and flung open his shirt to show off his brand new tattoo, eyes bloodshot and lambent with pride. It was the kind of wonderfully stupid gesture fueled by too much alcohol and too little sense that the romantically delusional were prone to, and yet not even Itachi had been immune to its charm.

But that had been a long time ago. He had only been sixteen.

"It's been pretty tough hiding it from the rest of the family all this time."

"Do you plan to stick to that even on your wedding night?"

The smile vanished from Shisui's lips, replaced by a tight, unhappy line. "No, I guess that wouldn't work, would it?"

"It's not too late to have it erased," Itachi said. "Or if you prefer, I would be happy to take care of it for you." He groped for the box-cutter on his desk, feeling suddenly delirious and hysterical. Shisui stood perfectly still as Itachi brought the unsheathed blade to his chest, and didn't flinch even when the tip of it nicked his skin.

A single dot of blood pearled out of the tiny wound, trickling slowly over pale skin. Itachi realized, with a detached sense of amazement, that he really _would_ cut out it out of Shisui. Or better yet, tear it out with his teeth, snapping into Shisui's flesh and filling his mouth with blood. He was jealous, oh yes indeed. He was monstrously jealous of Shisui, of the ease with which he had found his way to freedom. All he had to do was remove a tattoo, but what was Itachi going to do about the traces of Shisui still inside him? His cancerous essence had eaten its way into Itachi's marrow; he could write pages upon pages and never be able to rid Shisui from his bones.

"Seeing as it _is_ my name, I suppose it's only fair that I take it back."

"Nothing you do is fair," Shisui said. "Even this—you branded me for yourself, and now you're just throwing me away."

"I beg your pardon?" Itachi said incredulously. "It was your decision." They were both aware that this was no longer just about the tattoo. "I had no part in it—as I recall, I was not even _there_."

Shisui curled his fingers around Itachi's wrist—another curve, another coil. "It's yours," he said hoarsely, skirting a fracturing point. "All of it. You can take my skin, and all the rest of me as well. Everything I have has always been yours."

Itachi gritted his teeth and wrenched his wrist violently out of Shisui's grip. The box-cutter flew out of his hand, clattering away uselessly into a corner. The room spun, intoxicated stars whirling dizzily across heaven's dome. He threw himself down into his chair and put his trembling hand over his face, staring up at Shisui through a space between his fingers.

"Why would I take your skin, Shisui?" he asked, fighting the sobs of laughter that threatened to spill from his throat. "What would I do with another mask?"


	6. six

Yes, so I might have been lying about these stories being unconnected. This is the sequel to the previous vignette** -** and almost long enough to be a real fic. You may think I'd be ashamed of writing such blatant soap opera, but that just means you don't know me very well.

* * *

><p><strong>Asleep in the Human World<strong>

_Fools in love gently tearing each other limb from limb._

_. . .  
><em>

In the end, Itachi went to the wedding.

Fourteen separate people greeted him with, "Wow! You're actually here?" but that likely had more to do with the fact that he hadn't been seen in public in half a year rather than any potential indiscretion on the groom's part. The entire proceedings were just as tedious as he had imagined, and if Sasuke went back to the open bar _one more time_ Itachi was going to have to stage an impromptu intervention for his brother which would probably dampen the festive mood somewhat. A dull pain was creeping up between his temples; he yearned for nothing more than to return to bed where the death match with Chapter 17 beckoned in comparative benevolence.

But since he'd allowed himself to be trapped in this situation, Itachi figured he might as well make the most of it. Perhaps he might even make a toast. He had all the embarrassing childhood stories and the humiliating college anecdotes. It would be unkind to deprive the guests of such prime entertainment. Because in all frankness, Itachi was actually quite good at weddings. He had attended them all his life; at this point, it was like riding a bike. Downhill. Without brakes.

As he was weaving his way to the center of the room, he heard a voice say, "Wow. You're actually here?"

Itachi neither ran away nor reached for the nearest heavy object. He could feel tension crawling up the back of his neck, because he knew that voice and that as a corollary things were about to reach a level of intolerability previously unheard of.

He wheeled around and cracked a wooden smile, which Shisui summarily returned. He was wearing a full-length morning coat, and looked a bit like a mannequin in a bridal boutique's window, everything down to the vacant, plastic gaze.

"Thanks for the gift," Shisui said. "Was that a last minute decision too? Well, whatever it is, it must be nice, coming from you."

Itachi didn't say, "When you get divorced, I'll get you something even nicer," even though he was definitely thinking it. He said, "Don't think so meanly of me. I picked out your gift weeks ago. I wanted to have it delivered after the wedding and—"

"You could've at least fought for me," Shisui cut in bluntly.

Itachi stared at him. "Do you really want to do this here? _Now?_"

"Why not?" Shisui countered. "You'd rather do it at the reception dinner in front of the whole family? Because that can be arranged."

"How much have you had to drink?"

Enough, evidently, for him to forget where he was and make a grab for Itachi's hand. This was different from last night. Last night, Shisui had come to negotiate; now, he was looking for a fight. One which Itachi wasn't about to give him. He worked himself free and turned for the exit and the exitheexitexitexitex—

x

The ceiling was pale and dimly lit when he opened his eyes, and when he saw Shisui passed out in an armchair in the corner, Itachi had only just enough presence of mind to quietly reflect that he was so, so busted. His stirring roused Shisui, who straightened up and slowly massaged his eyelids. He was still wearing the tuxedo but the awful morning coat had gone AWOL and his collars were a lost cause. His hair looked like it had recently passed through a wind tunnel.

"Want some water?" Shisui asked quietly.

Itachi shook his head. "I apologize for… the disruption," he tried weakly.

Shisui's expression informed him exactly what he thought of this 'apology'. "_Stage III hepatic cancer?_" he said. "Somehow, you didn't think that your family might have wanted to know about something like that?"

"It was a late diagnosis to begin with," Itachi said. "I thought I would have more time."

"More time for _what?_ What were you waiting for?" Shisui rubbed his eyes with the heel of his palm, and then said, "Look, I get it," sounding gratingly diplomatic. "I get what you've been trying to do. This is why you've been holing up in your apartment and trying to make everyone leave you alone, isn't it? And this is why you broke up with—"

"You don't get _anything_." It was just a tiny bit gratifying to see Shisui flinch. "What are you even doing here, Shisui?" he said, staring at an extraordinarily white patch of wall. "You just got married. Go home to your wife, go on your honeymoon—I don't want you here."

"Itachi," Shisui said, quiet and dismayed.

"I don't want to _do_ this anymore," Itachi said, throat numb and tight. "Now please leave. I'd like to get some rest, if you don't mind."

He shut his eyes fiercely and gritted his teeth, and did not look until Shisui's dejected footsteps had grown silent. It was fine. Everything was under control. This was what he wanted.

When he looked up again, it was to the sight of his brother wandering into the room. He too was still clad in formalwear, but seemed to have "lost" his jacket somewhere.

"Father and Mother are stepping out to grab a bite," Sasuke said, making himself comfortable in the chair Shisui had vacated. "They said they'll be back in about an hour."

"You should have gone with them. Have you had anything to eat?"

"I'm fine right here." The expression on Sasuke's face finally settled and decided on a coherent emotion. "Is there anything I can do for you, nii-san?"

His anxious voice cut through right Itachi's mind, agitating the same resigned ache he'd been accommodating for the last few weeks. He gave his brother a smile that felt ridiculous and feeble even on his own lips. "There is one thing. If you don't mind, please get the keys from my jacket and go to my apartment. I need you to bring me something."

x

"It's after lights out, Uchiha-san!"

The woman who strode into his room looked all of twelve years old, but that didn't make the hard look on her young, earnest face any less stern. Itachi closed his laptop, blinking at the sudden light streaming in from the doorway. He hadn't realized how late it was, but then he never did seem to register those quiet hours spent with only the clack-clack-clacking of his keyboard for company, constant as raindrops.

The nurse—her name tag read: SONO KAEDE—made a disapproving noise, concern creasing her brows. "It's late," she said, and pulled the computer out of his grasp, setting it on the nightstand. "I'm sure this can wait." And when Itachi just stared at her, part-fascinated part-stupefied, Kaede grabbed a clipboard from the end of his bed and flipped open his chart. "Do you feel sick? These medications can sometimes cause nausea."

"Yes, I know," said Itachi, massaging his throat. "I was in outpatient care before this. I'm used to all the unpleasantness."

Kaede frowned, going through his chart. "You're not getting chemo or immunotherapy yet?"

"Not until after surgery, I'm afraid."

"And that's coming up," Kaede said quietly.

"Exactly," Itachi agreed. "As you can see, I'm on quite the deadline." He gave her his best gaze of grim, emaciated determination in hopes it might move her to relinquish his laptop, but no-go.

"So what is this project that you're working on so industriously?" Kaede said, smiling sweetly as she hovered over his bed. "If you don't mind me asking."

"Not at all," Itachi said. "I'm writing a novel."

"You're a writer?" Her eyes flared wide, and snapped back down to his chart. "Oh my God, are you—you wouldn't happen to be _the_ Uchiha Itachi, would you?"

"Which one is that?"

"I've read all of your books! Your writing is just—gosh, I have no words. Most of it goes right over my head of course, but it just _gets_ to me in some way, I don't even know how. But I had no idea you were, well, that you were so _young_. I mean, you'd never be able to tell from the writing but you can't be much older than _me_."

Kaede stopped abruptly, possibly realizing this might be kind of a tactless thing to say to a late-stage cancer patient. "My fiancée loves your work as well," she covered, smiling hesitantly. "It's sort of funny. We actually talked about one of your books on our first date."

"You're getting married?" Itachi asked. He figured he might as well play along, or she might never leave. "Congratulations."

"Yes." Kaede beamed. "We met in March, and a month ago, he proposed. Everyone I know thinks we're rushing into it, but… well, we love each other! That's enough for us. What's the point in waiting, you know?" She grinned, bashful. "Now you're probably thinking I'm simple."

"Simple is good," Itachi said. "But very difficult, in my experience."

"If you keep your expectations low, everything will be simple," Kaede said sagely. She gave him another shy smile, then turned out the light and left the room.

Alone, Itachi lay back down on his pillow and stared at the dark ceiling. "Is that what I've been doing?" he said, smiling to himself. "Have I kept my expectations too high?"

x

Things did not change for the better or worse over the next couple of days. He received remarkably few visitors, for which he was mostly glad. The family appeared to be keeping their distance, all with the exception of Sasuke who was a constant fixture that lurked by the door and took innumerable phone calls in the hallway, speaking in a tense, menacing tone that made Itachi feel a little sorry for whoever was on the other end.

He came back each time with drawn, harrowed shadows in his eyes, and Itachi couldn't help but think that it wouldn't do their family any good if every day he eked of his existence was a day siphoned from his brother's lifespan.

"Is there anything I can do for you, nii-san?" Sasuke asked for the sixth time since lunch—a mere two hours ago.

"Well, I could use another Coke, if you don't mind," Itachi said without looking up from the computer. His arms ached all over from all the needle punctures, but he went on typing.

"I thought you didn't like Coke."

"I don't, but since I'm not allowed coffee, I need to get my caffeine wherever I can."

Sasuke frowned. "So why don't you just go to sleep?" he asked. "This Diving Bell and the Butterfly crap you've got going on, it's seriously freaking me out."

Itachi lifted his eyes. "Perhaps you wouldn't feel this way if you shared my work ethics."

Sasuke glared at him. "That's really low."

"I'm very serious, Sasuke. Aren't your quarter exams coming up? It would be such a shame if you were to fail out of university because you've spent all your time terrorizing the nursing staff."

"Alright," Sasuke said crabbily. "I'll go home and cram all night, okay? Stop making big sad cancer eyes at me already."

He pulled up a chair and settled down next to the bed, lacing his fingers in front of his mouth, eyes flicking right and left. Itachi recognized this pose even from their childhood; whatever was chewing at Sasuke must be having a hell of a time. His brother was nothing if not subtle like a skull fracture.

"Nii-san."

"I'm listening."

"I've been talking to your doctor. She said that you're going to need brain surgery."

"So it seems."

"I thought 'hepatic' means liver cancer. Why do you need brain surgery if you have liver cancer?"

Itachi stared at the screen before him in resigned exhaustion. The blinking cursor had cut off a sentence that ended in 'lov-'. They had been dancing around an unbearable truth for so long it had gained haunted status. This exorcism was long overdue.

"The cancer is metastatic," he said, modulating his voice carefully. "It's already spread to my brain. Without surgery, the mets will kill me before chemotherapy has time to take effect. The doctors are hoping that the medications will shrink the tumors enough for them to operate, but the chances of success are fairly low."

Sasuke looked back at him, eyes hard and wide and very dark. "What does that mean?"

"It means I'm sick, Sasuke," Itachi said, though it barely came out. "I've been sick for awhile now, and it's quite likely that I'm not going to get better."

"Why are you saying all this?" Sasuke asked after an aching silence, his voice so raw and pained it must have been scraped out of his throat, his guts. "Why are you telling me all this _now?_"

"Because I'm running out of time," Itachi answered. "And because you're an adult." He ran these words over in his head, and smiled to himself. "You're an adult. How did that happen?"

Sasuke's face had the clear appearance of someone whose mind had just hit emergency brakes, screeching tires, smoking asphalt and all. He sank back down into his chair, boneless and defeated. "Fuck," he said, slamming his fist into the mattress over and over. "_Goddamn it._"

"This is it, Sasuke," Itachi murmured, stroking his brother's hair. "I'm sorry."

"For _what?_" Sasuke said, voice blurred and watery, but vehement. "For your terminal illness or for lying about it?"

"I'm not going to be able to be around for you anymore. I wish I could have done a better job, be a better brother, but… well. I'm sorry."

Sasuke squeezed his hands into the sheets, knuckles taut and bone-stark. "God, you're stupid," he gritted out. "Stupid, stupid, _stupid_."

x

After a week during which time the entire nursing staff became ruefully resigned to his unsightly habits and took to sneaking him mildly caffeinated beverages behind the doctors' backs, Itachi asked Kaede to help him make a call.

Shisui showed up barely fifteen minutes after receiving the message. He looked _dreadful_, restless and disheveled, bloodshot eyes enormous and taking over his face. Itachi couldn't help thinking meanly that perhaps domestic bliss wasn't all it was cracked up to be—but the way Shisui had swept into the room breathlessly and the crazy cocktail of hope and fear on his face made it very difficult for any amount of resentment to really stick.

"I came as quickly as I could," Shisui said first thing, and Itachi found he couldn't speak for a moment. This voice had been so dear to him for so long, he would never be used to that wild frantic edge it had acquired, the knowledge that it was he who had put it there. "The woman on the phone wouldn't answer any of my questions. Is something wrong?"

"Nothing is wrong. I have something to discuss with you. Will you please have a seat?"

Shisui quietly complied but kept his wariness, like he was measuring the situation, gauging for reactions. Neither of them said anything for a moment.

"Here," Itachi said finally, and handed Shisui a USB drive.

"What's this?"

"The book I've been writing for the last year. I've finished it."

"Oh," Shisui said, relieved. "That's… wow, that's great. So, what's it about?"

"Us."

Shisui blinked. "Come again?"

"It's about us. It's our story, from beginning to end. I've poured everything I have into it, and now I'm giving it to you."

"Seriously?" Shisui said, and laughed, embarrassed but pleased. "And you said you'd never stoop to navel-gazing." And while Shisui was still beaming at the small object in his hand like he couldn't even comprehend its _existence_, Itachi went on, "I'm not having the surgery."

Shisui's shoulders snapped, like he had been tasered. He stared at Itachi, sucker-punched, and this was unbelievably hard but he couldn't turn back now.

"It's unwise to gamble with such poor odds," Itachi explained. "I'm grateful for the time I have had, and the reason I'm telling you this is because I hope we can settle our differences and put everything behind us. For whatever little time I have left, I'd like to have my best friend there."

He waited for a moment, and when he received no reply, said, "Can you keep an eye on Sasuke for me? He's smart, but he's stubborn. He doesn't know how to take care of himself. I know you two don't always get along, but—you were good with me. You were a brother to me, and I'd like you to try to be one for mine as well."

"So that's it?"

Itachi looked up in surprise, and saw that Shisui's eyes were dark and hollowed with some nameless, aching depth. "Wow," he said, soft but caustic. "If I didn't believe something was wrong with your brain before, I sure as hell do now."

Without warning, he rose to his feet and threw the USB drive out the open window.

"You—"

"You give me this and ask me to look after your brother, and what—I'm supposed to be _happy_ now?" Shisui said savagely. "That you've completed your magnum opus and can now peacefully go into the afterlife without any regrets? Is that what's going on here?"

"Shisui…"

"Shut up," Shisui snarled. "Let me tell you exactly what's going to happen if you don't have that surgery," he continued, still in that flat, matter-of-fact tone that seemed to drill a hole into Itachi's skull. "Let me tell you what your death will do to the people you supposedly love. Your family will be destroyed. Your brother? He's going to be gutted. He'll be completely broken and there won't be a _single_ thing that anyone will be able to do about it. And I'm not going to be able to take care of him because if you die – _if you die_ – I will be just as broken. _I'll_ be destroyed. _I'll_ be the one who'll need to be looked after."

He knocked the chair out of his way and began to pace up and down the room, frenetic. "You may not realize this, Itachi—oh what am I saying, of course you do." Shisui put his hand over his mouth, stifling a crazed, corrosive laugh. "I don't _see_ you anymore." He stopped pacing and looked up at Itachi, so wrung out and empty it seemed a dried husk had taken his place. "When I look at you, I don't see my cousin. I don't see my best friend. I don't see the brilliant, wonderful, _breathtaking_ person I fell in love with, because _all I see now_is the cancer."

Itachi just stared at Shisui impotently, clenching a handful of bed sheet. Shisui looked completely insane, and might at any moment evolve to _dangerously_ insane. He debated running for it, but figured that with the IV stand attached to his body he probably wouldn't get very far.

"Is that what you're asking me to be around for? You think you'll have time but to us, you'll already be gone. It won't be you that we'll be living with—just this fucking disease."

"Shisui, just stop it – I'm – "

"You've got an inhuman capacity for determination. Once you set your mind to something you stick with it, and I love that about you but it's not going to fly here. So _no_, you _do not_ have my support. I'm not going to stick around to hold your hand as you gracefully walk into the light. If you don't have that surgery, I'm _done_. I'm _not_ giving you permission to die."

He stomped forward and dragged Itachi up by the front of his scrubs, almost lifting him from the bed. "You didn't want to fight for me," Shisui said. "Fine, I can accept that—but you sure as _hell_ have to fight for this. Fight for _yourself_, if no one else. Use your fucking determination for _that_."

At that moment, the door swung open and Sasuke walked in. He immediately took in the situation, eyes flaring in shock and anger. "What the hell do you think you're doing?" Sasuke yelled, furious colors rushing into his cheeks.

Shisui let go of Itachi. "I know," he said roughly, spinning on his heel. "I was just leaving."

"Wait."

Everyone turned to look at Itachi, who swallowed and said, "Sasuke, can you give us a moment?"

His brother still looked torn between reading Shisui the riot act or just cutting straight to the fisticuff, but after a moment deflated and made one last noise of rage before stalking out. The thick silence suddenly made the room enormous, unwieldy in size and scope, diluting the oxygen content to the point where it became difficult to breathe.

"Just one thing," Itachi said. "I did want to fight for you."

"What?" Shisui said, but Itachi held up his hand to quiet him.

"I did want to fight for you. But I told myself that I couldn't do that to you."

As Shisui looked on in confusion, Itachi gestured helplessly at his computer, lying on the bedside table. "This is all I know how to do. You know how it is. I'm not good with people. I lock myself up to write for _months _at a time. I don't have any friends, my parents barely speak to me anymore—as far as family goes, you and Sasuke are about it."

Shisui smoothed his hand over his mouth, muffling what sounded like a choked-off sob.

"Don't think that I'm taking all the blame for this," Itachi said sickly. "You made a choice too and that's on you—but at least you tried. You tried to fight, and I drove you away. I _convinced _myself that it was your decision so I could let you go and let myself off the hook."

None of it seemed worth it now, he realized in sickening horror, all those nights wandering around his huge, empty apartment looking for something he never managed to find, going through boxes and boxes of Shisui's stuff, shoes and books and CDs, the worn-soft soccer jersey from his junior year and ancient issues of _Shounen Jump _Shisui had adamantly refused to throw out. Missing him so much he couldn't breathe. All of it parsed now in a bleak miserable blur, dissipated like morning dew.

"You're the best thing that's ever happened to me," he went on, and that was when his voice began to break. "I know I'm no good for you. I want you to leave, I want to be selfless. I want you to be happy. But—" He grappled with himself for a moment, fighting the blockade in his throat, and before he knew it all the words he'd never found the sounds to shape came rushing out in a debilitating flood. "Don't leave me, Shisui," he heard himself beg. "I'm sorry I didn't fight for you. I want you to be happy but I can't let you go. I—"

"Goddamn it, just shut up already," Shisui said, grabbing Itachi's face with both hands, palms pressed tightly to his cheeks. "If you say any more of this stupid crap, _I'm_ going to need surgery to revive all the brain cells you've killed."

He clambered onto the bed, shoes and all, and hauled Itachi into his lap. Shisui kissed his mouth, his neck, his temple—any and every patch of skin he could reach, enforcing silence with his quick, desperate lips. Itachi was fully aware that they were plowing headlong into home-wrecking territory now but he couldn't help himself, and had no intention to anyway. Instead, he buried his face into the hollow of Shisui's shoulder and clung to him in a sick mimicry of a drowning victim, digging his fingers into Shisui's arms like he was his last lifeline. _I was here first. I branded him for myself—he's mine and no one else's._

"I've been thinking," Itachi muttered, feeling kind of insane, feverish and unhinged. "I can't really stand the thought of you sleeping with other people. So maybe I shouldn't die just yet."

"If you die, I'll hate you forever," Shisui said, sounding equally deranged. "I'll vilify you at family gatherings and spread horrendous lies about you in the tabloids and make all your fangirls cry. So yeah, let's not have anybody die if we can help it."

A sniffling sound followed this statement, and just when Itachi thought this whole thing couldn't get any less dignified, he saw that Shisui's flushed cheeks were streaked with tears, that his eyes had gone all glassy and he was hiccupping for breaths. His own skin also felt suspiciously wet, so he reached for Shisui's face and sealed their lips back together, just in case those desperate, needy noises in the back of his throat decided to turn into full-on sobs. So this was how you did it—kiss in words, kiss in apologies, each of them coronated with a glowing imperative, the soothing ambient light of a single-minded purpose—and the way Shisui looked afterward, raw and bruised and burst open, only meant that the healing process started _now_.

"There's one more thing," Itachi said gravely.

Shisui frowned, cautious. "What?"

"If I have surgery, they're going to shave all my hair off. And with chemotherapy after that, I won't be getting it back any time soon."

For a moment, Shisui looked faintly horrorstricken. Then he snorted and said, "Well, we'll see about getting you a really pretty wig. How do you feel about purple?"

x

"So your surgery is tomorrow?"

Itachi nodded. "The scans from this morning showed that most of the mets have shrunken considerably. The doctors think they can go in and take them out."

"Are these doctors good?" Shisui asked suspiciously. "I don't want some _hack_ cutting into my boyfriend's brain, know what I mean?"

"That would be terrible," Itachi said dryly. "Then I would be bald _and _brain-damaged."

The air between them was saturated with all the things that weren't being said, such as his 17% survival rate or the fact that he might not wake up after surgery, or just croak on the table altogether. Even if all went well, he still had a long, exhausting fight ahead of him. There was no timeline. Waiting, watching, hoping, that was all that they had to look forward to.

But at least now, they could wait and watch and hope together, and that had to count for something. In all the ways that mattered, it counted a lot.

"Want to hear some juicy gossip?"

"Hmm?"

"Asako is filing for divorce," Shisui said, sheepish. "I have to say, that's got to be one of the shortest marriages in the history of this family."

Itachi didn't smile. Outwardly. "What happened?"

"Well, I'm never home, for one thing," Shisui explained. "And the fact that I told her that I've been in love with you for ten years might also have had something to do with it."

Itachi tried to prevent his eyes from rolling into the back of his head, but it was very hard. Suddenly, brain cancer seemed like an infinitely more merciful fate. "So I take it the merger won't be happening after all," he said bleakly. "How did that go over with the board?"

"No idea," Shisui said, brazen. "I gave my two weeks' notice before I spilled the beans. They can find some other sucker to put out to stud, but I'm done."

"Our parents…"

Shisui shrugged. "Well, Dad's not speaking to me, but that's not actually a new development. Your parents looked slightly catatonic when I broke the news, but I'm sure they'll get over it in time. The fact that you have cancer will probably help it along." He pulled a face. "Everyone else seemed sort of unsurprised. It's so insulting."

"It's because we're so terrible," Itachi said, almost serene. "Illness and humiliation, that's how the gods punish awful people."

"You're incredibly hilarious," Shisui muttered. He looked Itachi deep in the eye. "Listen, I'm not going to lie, it's probably going to be rocky for at least a little while." There had to be an award for such a colossal understatement. "But I promise you'll still have your family, when all's said and done. Sasuke, definitely. He's vulturing the cafeteria as we speak"

"And you," Itachi added.

"And me." Shisui grinned at him. "But let's face it, I'm a sure thing."

"If I make it out of this alive, please promise that you'll never quote that movie at me again."

"If you make it out of this surgery, you can have whatever you want," Shisui said. "Seriously, you just have to ask, no need to threaten to skin me with a box-cutter anymore."

Itachi stared at him pointedly. "You didn't seem very threatened at the time."

"No," Shisui admitted, mouth curving into a smirk. "Actually, it was even kind of hot."

"Perhaps you're the one who's sick."

In response, Shisui just took his hand and pressed his mouth gracefully to the knuckles. This was the kind of thing that made it so easy to fall in love with him, Itachi reflected. The real trouble was surviving the experience.

"How much time have I got until visiting hours are over?" Shisui asked.

Itachi glanced at the clock. "About an hour or so."

A sly look flickered across Shisui's face. He shrugged off his jacket, toed off his shoes and then climbed up on the bed, curling around Itachi like a human cocoon, dragging the blanket over them both. Itachi made some obligatory protesting noises but his head was foggy and Shisui smelled really nice, wind and leather and quality aftershave, so he kind of forgot what he was thinking and decided to just enjoy the probably-transient moment. He had a feeling his life would have been infinitely simpler had he adopted this mode of thought earlier and more frequently.

"Sasuke might come in."

"Let him," Shisui said. "I'm looking forward to the mental-scarring." He laughed softly. "Did I mention he's changing his major?"

"He's what?"

"Yeah, to _premed_. He wants to be an _oncologist_. Can you imagine that brat in a lab with his punk hair trying to grow cell cultures?"

Itachi sighed. "I've ruined my brother's life."

"More like _redefined_ it," Shisui said, still creepily upbeat. "It's what you do, you redefine people. Just like how you redefined me."

Itachi grimaced. "My nausea is very bad these days, please don't add to it." After a moment, he continued, totally nonchalant, "Did you ever get that tattoo removed?"

In response, Shisui just peeled open his shirt. "Even if I hadn't said anything, divorce was inevitable," he said. "It was like I was already married. The whole thing felt like infidelity."

He tucked his face into the curve of Itachi's neck and slipped his hand inside his hospital gown, fingers lazily stroking the line of his stomach, the toasty skin. "Sorry about the whole—tossing your manuscript out the window thing. I got caught up in the moment."

"Don't trouble yourself over it," Itachi said lightly. "I already mailed a copy to my agent beforehand. It's being published whether you like it or not. Now the whole world will learn about our story."

"I hope it tanks," Shisui muttered darkly.

"I wouldn't say that if I were you. We're about to become impoverished soon. I'm drowning in medical bills, and you're unemployed."

"I can use the free time," Shisui said with worrying alacrity. "And when you've recovered, think of all the sex we can have." He lifted his chin long enough to make that appalling face that meant he was thinking about Itachi naked. "_Real_ sex, not weepy morbid cancer sex."

Whether Itachi was tired or had simply used up his supply of snarky comebacks in his latest masterpiece he didn't know, but he let the comment slide. "I take back what I said before," he said drowsily. "If I die, Shisui, you're allowed to sleep with other people."

"Shut up," Shisui ordered, pressing a kiss to the curve of his shoulder. "It'll be years before we have to worry about that."

x

**end**


	7. seven

Side story to the _last_ installment. 'Unconnected' really doesn't mean anything anymore, does it?

I have to confess that I like Sasuke a lot more than I let on, which is why this is possibly the most self-insert-y piece of fanfiction I've ever written.

* * *

><p><strong>The Boy Ain't Right<strong>

...**  
><strong>

Yesterday when Sasuke had woken up, it had been sunny. He remembered being highly irritated with this fact since he had had a wedding to attend and a nice hailstorm might have provided him with a cozy excuse to get out of it. Rolling out of bed, he had reflected upon his hatred of formalwear and public functions, which had devolved into an elaborate tangent about his misfortune of being born into one of possibly five families in all of Japan that still bought into this archaic crap. It had ended with him making a resolution to get himself so fantastically shitfaced at the reception that the doubtlessly horrible memories of this day would have already been wiped from his mind by the following morning.

Today, it was still sunny when he got up, but nothing else was the same. Today, Sasuke didn't worry about weddings, or formalwear, or soul-crushing familial mores. Today, he would give anything for things to go back to the way they had been yesterday morning.

It was just beginning to get dark when he stepped out of the hospital, the cityscape all noirish and glittering with moving headlights, a nascent dimming. He had skipped three lectures today and was already fifteen minutes late to his group research meeting, which gave him about another fifteen before Sakura began sending concerned text messages and Naruto started calling at mind-bogglingly annoying three and a half minute intervals. He had also promised Itachi to go home and hit the books. Obviously, the thing to do was to go get fantastically shitfaced.

Traffic slowed to nothing around him as he crossed the street. The bar was dark, low-ceilinged and still mostly empty, the usual patrons—hospital staff, presumably—not yet released from the daily, life-saving grind. He was halfway to the bar when someone said, "Little Sasuke."

Shisui looked incredibly out of place in this shithole of a dive. Only up close and with a sharp eye could you see the wear and tear in his well-suited, clean-shaven disguise, the tousled signs of the bad seed. "You grew up so fast. Come have a drink, 's on me."

"I can pay for my own liquor," Sasuke said, but took a seat. There was an expensive bottle of scotch on the table, a glass in Shisui's hand. The one without the wedding ring.

Shisui gazed at him with scrutiny. "You don't like me very much," he said flatly. "It's okay. No need to deny it. Younger siblings always hate the first boyfriend."

Sasuke raised an eyebrow. "Beg your pardon?"

"Don't try to fake it." Shisui waved his hand. "You knew about us. You're like his other half, even if he hadn't told you you'd have still figured it out by yourself." He laid down his glass and lowered his voice into an almost-comedic whisper. "Can I tell you something, Sasuke?"

Sasuke shrugged. "Make it short. I've got somewhere to be."

"I'll try my best," Shisui said facetiously. "This was about three months ago. I came home from work, and I'd just. There was this project that I'd been slaving over for almost a year, my golden baby, and it'd just wrapped up that day, and I was—I was happy. I was really – fucking – high, and I had all these crazy shit flying around in my head."

Sasuke didn't ask if the nose candy had been substandard that day, but he was thinking it.

"First thing I did walking through the door, I started talking about—fuck, about all these plans. Because I had all these plans for the future, you know? I wanted to come clean to everyone and just be done with all the secrecy and pussying around. What was so wrong about that? Well there he was, sitting at the kitchen counter drinking a creamy black-and-tan, listening to me talk. He just got this look—this weird as hell look on his face, and didn't say a thing. The next day, I was told that I was moving out. After ten years, he ended it, just like that."

"You don't say," Sasuke muttered, rolling his eyes.

"Ten fucking years." Shisui stared at the ceiling. "That's longer than the average marriage. Ten years of skulking around doing things on his terms and trying to hide it from friends and colleagues and the whole goddamn family, and the minute I suggested making a real thing out of it, _bam_, he spooked."

Behind the counter, the barman was busying himself setting up shop, assiduously wiping down the scarred wood of the bar top. Some kind of sports program was playing at low volume, the static-filled radio babbling somewhere amongst the rows of glasses.

"The timing couldn't have been more spectacular," Shisui was saying, "because not a week later my old man came by with a request—nah, an order for me to go to a marriage meeting. So I said fine, whatever, and I went to the interview. Everything was moving so fast, but I kept telling myself, 'He'll come around, he'll come around,' and before I knew it I was standing in a reception hall in a morning coat putting a ring on some girl's finger, and I remembered looking down into the crowd and seeing him standing there—_clapping_. I wanted to _kill_ him."

Sasuke had the sudden nebulous thought that he, too, would like to kill a very specific someone. His bloodlust was lost on Shisui, who was still babbling a mile a minute. "The sick thing is it's only now that I realize—the look from that day? That weird look he got when I told him about all my plans? That wasn't the look of some commitment-phobe freaking out about intimacy."

Shisui slammed his glass down on the table with a clunking noise, and looked Sasuke hard in the eyes. "You know what that look was, Sasuke? You know what it means? That was the look of someone who'd just been handed a death sentence. Someone with a living horror smoldering deep inside them, ready to ignite their body from the inside out."

Some veil of coolness was slipping off. Sasuke tilted his head and said, evenly, "You realize hearing all this isn't doing anything to lessen my desire to hit you over the head with this bottle, right?" He planted his hand on the table between them, palm up. "Give me your car keys."

"What?"

"Give me your _fucking car keys_. I need you around long enough to fix the mess you made, so it'd be very inconvenient if you threw yourself headfirst through the windshield driving home."

Shisui shrank back a little in his seat, while several people in the bar turned to stare at them. Sasuke's ears were pounding like a theater drum, but he tried his best to stay calm.

Sasuke didn't like Shisui. He never had, and he especially despised the way the entire family treated him like the sun shone out of his ass. He already had everyone else eating out of his hand, why the hell did he have to come pawing for Sasuke's brother, invade the close circuit of Itachi's guarded love? That this man beside Sasuke, this random insignificant breathing organism could be responsible for such flawless devastation seemed like a cruel hoax. And he also didn't get how Itachi of all people could have fallen for this smarmy asshole when he could do fifty—_one hundred_ times better. It must have been of those stupid, temporarily insane things, Sasuke had always reasoned to himself, but then ten years had flitted by and suddenly here they were.

So no, he didn't like Shisui, but he still had to be on his side because Shisui was _here_ and nobody else was. Sasuke had spent more hours than he could count in the past two days alone raging over the fact that everyone else seemed to be taking it so well—that everyone was somehow _fine with it_. How were they fine with it when it felt like his whole fucking world was crashing down all around him? Shisui was the only other person whose world appeared to be crashing down all around him as well, and that was why Sasuke had no choice but to be on his side.

Presently, Shisui stopped staring at him like a stunned antelope and meekly surrendered his keys. Sasuke pocketed them before waving one of the servers over. "Call us a cab." His phone was vibrating on the tabletop; he let it go to voicemail. Across the table, Shisui had slumped over in his chair, one hand slung limply over his face. He was possibly crying, but Sasuke didn't care enough to verify. The half-emptied bottle sat before him, catching a spill of yellow light from the dimmed lamps. Sasuke reached for it, and then forced himself to put it back down. Couldn't be weak. Couldn't let the tidal pull of helplessness crush him under now. The fight was long and hard. Itachi was sick, Shisui was a wreck, and there was no one else around.

Sasuke closed his eyes for a moment, letting his mind swim in the murk. The weight of his fatigue felt so insurmountable tonight. Nevertheless, he stared straight ahead at the slim horizon, clutched the wheel in a seaman's grip. Ready to ferry them from the despairing, drifting sea to solid land. _Is this really what you want, niisan?_

_Well, alright then._


	8. eight

**TELL ME THE NAME OF YOUR SWEETHEART**

. . .

THE electric clock next to the register had just hit 11:53 when the four boys walked in. They shared some remarkably striking features, jet black hair and sooty grey eyes, and for a moment Yumi wondered wistfully if they hadn't come to duke it out for her hand, which would be hot in a bodice ripper kind of way. (Nightshifts were soul-killing and you had to make your own fun.)

But the group split up as soon as they entered the store and merged into the aisles without once glancing in her direction, so she decided they weren't so hot after all—in fact, one had a lazy eye and another was sort of hare-lipped and yet another was just really, really bland. The fourth and shortest, who had stayed behind and looked slightly uncomfortable to be standing in a NinjaMart at seven to midnight, was actually the most promising in the looks department, but he was also wearing an ANBU uniform and those could easily make 6's look like 10's to the untrained eye.

While Yumi was still pondering this, Wonky Eye, Hare Lip, and Boring walked up to the counter and dumped a small mountain of merchandise in front of her: all the unsold Valentine chocolates in the store.

Yumi stared at them, horrified. "You guys want to buy all these?"

"Oh, no, no," Hare Lip replied, eyes huge. "Uchiha-_taichou_is the one buying." He nudged the shortest of the group forward. "Isn't that right, taichou?"

Pretty Face made a vaguely assenting noise, looking deeply martyred. He seemed moments away from disengaging from the proceedings by knocking himself soundly about the head.

"You know how it is," Hare Lip went on, gratingly smug. "Some people just have no luck with these kinds of things." Wonky Eye and Boring began to snigger, and Yumi was just about to launch into a tirade about there being nothing wrong with not having luck on Valentine's and who the hell cared about this stupid day anyway when a petite silhouette zipped through the door.

_"Hold it right there!"_

The person who skidded to a halt in front of the quartet turned out to be an enviably pretty girl in a frilly pink dress. She had one hand held up in front of her like a crossing guard. Her long hair fanned out dramatically behind her when a wind of undetermined origin swept through the store.

"Itachi-sempai!" the girl cried, fiery with determination. "I am _so_ glad to run into you here. I looked all over for you and I was really, really, _really_afraid I wouldn't be able to find you in time but here you are!"

She said all of this in one supernaturally long breath. Yumi worried about asphyxiation.

Pretty Fa—Itachi seemed to share some of her concern. "I'm sorry, but have we..?"

"Shinobu Mizuko, second-year Genin!" the girl supplied, tucking a sleek strand of hair behind her ear. "I was a year below you at the Academy."

"I don't seem to recall—"

"That is because Itachi-sempai is so _amazing_," Mizuko gushed. "I just know someone as awesome as he would never even notice my existence, but I just can't deny these _feelings_." She stared into his face with rapt passion and shoved an enormous heart-shaped box in his hands. There was a pale pink note on delicate lace-edged stationery tucked into the elaborate curls of gold ribbons.

"I have loved you madly and unquestioningly for a long, long time," Mizuko declared, eyes blazing and cheeks luminous. "Please accept these clumsy homemade treats." Then she squeaked, bowed deeply, and ran away.

Nobody said anything for a very long time.

"Well," Itachi said, turning to Yumi with a serene expression. "It seems like my sempai—" he indicated his slack-jawed companions "—will be taking care of this purchase after all. I beg you goodnight, oneesan."

_It's totally not just the uniform_, Yumi thought, awed, while in the background the genetically inferior trio could be heard muttering, "Who the fuck was that anyway?" and, "I thought I told you to take care of it," and, "Damn it, she was pretty cute," as they grudgingly drew out their wallets and doled out a pathetic pile of coins.

Quietly, the clock jumped to 12:01.

**-x-**

ITACHI paused for a moment when he stepped out on the curb. Then he turned a corner, walked two blocks, and stopped at the intersection. He flicked his eyes carefully to his left, then right, and finally said, "You can come out now."

A faint snort was his only response. 'Shinobu Mizuko' stepped out from behind a power pole and performed a delicate curtsy, batting her artfully curled lashes. "Does sempai not enjoy his gift?" she asked sweetly.

"I'm getting some very mixed signals." He held up the pink note. It simply said **IDIOT**. Bolded, and underlined. Five times.

"What about my acting skills?"

Itachi waited patiently for the smoke from the Henge to clear. "You really didn't have to do that."

"I had to save you from the crushing moronism of your actions," Shisui said imperiously. "Are you mad? Playing punishment games? How old are we now?"

Itachi's chin longed to jut itself forward. "Perhaps you should ask your colleagues."

"I intend to," Shisui said, cracking his knuckles with a worrisome gleam in his eyes. "They were blocking girls from approaching you all day, did you know?"

"Yes, I was aware of that."

"And yet you still—"

"I already agreed to the terms of the bet. A certain amount of sabotage was to be expected."

"God, what did they _do_ to you?" Shisui said, frowning. "Was blackmail involved? Did anyone say anything, I don't know, _mean?_"

Itachi failed to produce a response.

"_Well?_"

"No, Shisui, nobody said anything _mean_," he said with biting emphasis. "They seemed to be under the impression that I was… monopolizing your time. A minor misunderstanding, that's all."

"They thought—" Shisui's face had the disbelieving gape-mouthed look of a fish stranded on land who, dying, found the experience profoundly and utterly perplexing. "Oi, what kind of warped logic is that? Every one of those imbeciles is doing paperwork until they cry for their mommies, you just wait and see."

"You weren't promoted so you can abuse your authority frivolously," Itachi reminded him. "Besides—" he curled his mouth in distaste "—they are your friends."

"And so are you," Shisui argued. "And I like you way more than them anyway. You think I'd cross-dress just for anyone?"

It wasn't until he heard the cellophane crackling that Itachi realized he was passionately gripping the chocolate box. "Well, I supposed you'll want these back," he muttered, not-at-all reluctant.

"You can keep them," Shisui said. "They actually _are_homemade, at least according to Hana. Though maybe you shouldn't actually eat them. They might have doggie treats inside."

Itachi did not throw the box at Shisui's head, and he wasn't sure if that was because he was genuinely fond of his friend, or because he had always been taught not to waste food. "You gave me chocolates given to you by _someone else?_" Perhaps Sasuke could be persuaded to consume them on his behalf. His teeth weren't permanent anyway.

"Don't worry, I got tons more where those came from," Shisui said loftily, like that was going to make anyone feel better about receiving his sloppy seconds. "Just get me something nice for White Day and we'll call it even."

"Shisui, we're both _boys_."

"Moooou, sempai is so _stingy_. Not cute at all, so unworthy of my love."

"Just take these back then."

Shisui stopped dead in his track. He gasped and looked utterly heartbroken, because they raised children wrong in the Uchiha clan. "You don't want my chocolates? My love has been rebuffed?"

Why did he _know_someone like Shisui?

"If I'm ruined for marriage forever because of this rejection, Itachi-sempai must take responsibility."

"…and responsibility is," Itachi said with a sinking feeling.

"To take care of me for the rest of my life, of course," Shisui said earnestly, laying one hand over his chest. "A pure maiden's heart is a beautiful and fragile thing."

"I," Itachi said, and exhaled. "Thank you for your—" he fished around for a word "—love."

"Ah, my love," Shisui laughed, so very delighted with his perceived cleverness. "My love is but a drop in the ocean." He flicked Itachi's bangs playfully, fingertips brushing the skin of his forehead. "So don't forget about White Day. I'm not really into chocolate but I'll take a batch of mommy's sakuramochi if you can spare it."

Itachi calmly reflected on his predicament, watching the white puffs of Shisui's breath disappear into the pale spill of streetlight. Sure, his mother would probably find his request for cooking lessons somewhat bizarre, but such oddities were common occurrences in their household and he was certain she would get over it. And if by some freak chance he grabbed a bottle of rat poison while reaching for the vanilla extract, he'd just have to chalk it up to a simple novice's mistake.

. . .

**THE END**


End file.
